Enigmatic Seed

The landscape of tea gardens is enchanting

In tea garden country,

These braided olive-green undulations,

Camellia sinensis,

Suggestive of secretive and arcane ways

Of Wuyi, the precious leaf's homeland.

 

On motorcycle, ascending, revolving fields of vision

Shed tiny slivers of their encasing enigma.

In rippling vistas, bushes fastidiously trimmed.

In recent centuries, sun-ravaged pilgrims of commerce

Strove to prise out the seed's fable.

 

Inscrutable shadows brood under the prissy tea bushes,

Hushing the spritely bluey-green tops,

Born out of antique chestnut earth.

The hill's limb traces a violin curve

 

But the chirping cicadas, their harsh base line,

Bear upon that spell, while

At intervals, eucalyptus stands

Raise their tattered screens,

Almost de-materialising in blue afternoon heat.

 

We stop by the peeling trunk of a cork oak.

It fries and warps, breathlessly bemoaning its piebald crown.

Not much good for shelter.

Breeze has dropped and,

In the stillness, the shadows seem to advance,

Concealing the ancient seed's secret.

 

We have intruded.

The cicadas grow shriller,

Drowning out the trembling leaves' whisper.

Gradually, the cerulean light, sky of putti,

Retreats behind gun-metal blue,

Forming a more Formosan colour grouping

 

With succulent oily green and terracotta.

The sight of the weathered fuel tank

Induces our thirst, twist flask cap.

Chinese drinking vessels are minute.

Within is pale green and sweet liquid.

 

A picker nods, and passes by, face ruddy.

A melodic nocturne plays plaintive minor keys.

Cicadas fade again,

And there is rightness to all sights and sounds.

All things fit, stretch in space, join neatly.

 

My breath deepens,

The brain relents the chase,

No words are uttered.

We ride with the enigma.